There are a wide range of environmental control systems in the aviation industry, such as refrigeration systems for cooling various control or operative components or systems. For instance, vapor cycle cooling systems are used on aircraft as environmental control units to cool various components during operation.
Certain aircraft have substructures, commonly called "pods" which house computers, cameras, thermo-imagers, lasers, and other mechanisms and motors to move the cameras or other devices during operation. Umbilical cords feed back to the aircraft cockpit or other areas as information lines from the instruments within the pods. Of course, a wide range of other instruments or components commonly are housed in pods or other similar substructures. The operative mechanisms of these instruments or components often must be cooled by some form of refrigeration or thermal control unit such as a vapor cycle cooling system.
One of the major problems with such support systems is the maintainability or serviceability thereof. A vapor cycle cooling system includes such mechanisms as compressors, evaporators, condensers, condenser fans, motors and related control mechanisms. Should any of these devices become inoperative, heretofore it has been common either to make attempts to replace or repair the inoperative device or to remove the entire thermal control unit and replace the unit with a completely operative system. In the past, such maintenance or service required a variety of tools and consumed an inordinate amount of time. When dealing with maintainability or serviceability on the flight line, time consumption can be disasterous. These problems are magnified when maintenance or servicing must be done in circumstances of rain, wind or cold conditions, as well as when dealing with non-technical maintenance personnel.
There is a need for and this invention is directed to providing a new environmental control system wherein a thermal control unit can be attached and disconnected readily and with speed, and without requiring any tools whatsoever. The invention provides a support system affording maintainability and serviceability not heretofore available.